In a typical solar system, panels are strung together and the energy they produce is fed into a single inverter. This inverter converts the energy into useable energy that can be used throughout your home. The main limitation with this setup is that the system can only perform as well as the lowest performing panel. This means that if one or more panels are under-performing, all the panels in the system will be under-performing.This typically happens when a panel becomes shaded by trees, leaves, cloud cover or dirt/dust. With an Enphase Microinverter system, this isn’t an issue. Each panel has its own smaller inverter installed directly underneath, with each panel independently outputting energy. If one panel starts under-performing, only that single panel is affected.
Here at Penrith Solar Centre we offer Enphase Microinverter systems because they are the world’s most technologically advanced inverter system without any compromise to reliability
Don’t Have Shading Issues?
Even if you don’t suffer from tree shading, there’s still plenty of other obstructions that can cause panels to under-perform. These obstructions most commonly include leaves, cloud cover, dirt/dust and bird droppings. Even if you have perfectly clean panels with no shading, panels will degrade in performance over time. If one panel degrades faster than the others, the whole system will perform at that lower output if Microinverters aren’t used.
Advanced Monitoring
Since each panel has it’s own individual inverter, each panel can be independently monitored. Each inverter is connected to the Envoy (the brain of the Microinverter system) via a two way communications cable. The Envoy collects all of the data from each of the panels to produce in-depth data about each individual panel, as well as the system as a whole.
A huge benefit of this advanced monitoring system is being able to accurately find faults in your system. Through the monitoring app you’re able to see the output of each panel, and in the event that one panel is under-performing, you are able to easily identify which panel is affected.